Chain of command for those who welcome loved ones into the Spirit World?

[Calm]

You can generally get rid of long links just by refreshing the page before copy/pasting the link as that gets rid of the search parameters or whatever they are.

If that doesn’t work (Amazon can be finicky), deleting everything up to the ? doesn’t make a difference (I use the ? as that is easier for me to remember, but you can also delete up to the “ref”, leave the “/“ iirc)

Edited May 11, 2025 by Calm

[The Nehor]

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

I didn't say that, did I? I only suggested that an afterlife might increase the possibility to an atheist that there might be a God, after all.

I just don’t think that being in a place that is called Spirit Prison would be indicative of a loving God. You could still potentially reason your way to one but I don’t think it would be intuitive.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

Perhaps new religions did pop up. It is certain that those who had an earthly religion that taught about an afterlife that didn't resemble what they found when they entered it, might have sought explanations that led to a new religion. 

But President Joseph F. Smith's revelation or vision of the Spirit World suggests that if there were new religions, they may have evaporated upon the arrival of the Son of God, who would have been clothed in eternal glory after his successful Atonement.

You might want to re-read D&C 138. 

Christ's consecration of missionaries is described as follows:

D&C 138:29 And as I wondered, my eyes were opened, and my understanding quickened, and I perceived that the Lord went not in person among the wicked and the disobedient who had rejected the truth, to teach them;
30 But behold, from among the righteous, he organized his forces and appointed messengers, clothed with power and authority, and commissioned them to go forth and carry the light of the gospel to them that were in darkness, even to all the spirits of men; and thus was the gospel preached to the dead. [emphasis added]

Jesus did not minister in person and being clothed with power and authority may be just as visible there as it is here. In other words most people can’t tell. We clothe our missionaries with power and authority but most don’t notice.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

It seems that He did more than just say to them, "Go forth!" He first clothed them with power and authority. That suggests that they might have been recognizable as having been sent by someone important. This is especially interesting to me, how things are done there, since I am possibly closer to arrival there than you are. 

Possible it is different there. Just not much information. I am not really looking forward to it when it comes. Assuming it is how we describe it. Could be better. Could be worse. Could be nothing.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

I didn't say that. I said "The reason why God keeps his counsel hidden among mortals is to avoid trammeling on our free agency. But this concern would be lessened in the Spirit World."

By which I meant that to atheists, for example, the fact of life after death would provide some credible evidence that they might be wrong. Being perhaps open to a more nuanced experience would no more remove their agency than my spiritual experiences here in mortality removes mine.

Maybe. I am cynical and pessimistic though. Maybe death makes people think more clearly?

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

Just because you find yourself among people you had not known in life does not make you alone. Any more than you visiting a town you had never before visited makes you alone. Just say Hi! to the first person you meet, and ask him or her a question. I don't expect it is any different in the Spirit World.

I have to talk to people I don’t know? I really am in hell!

Kidding…..mostly.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

Says who? Where do you get the idea that baptism is required for entry into Paradise? If that were the case, then when Christ visited Paradise to preach to the spirits he couldn't have been met by any prophets, such as Isaiah, Ezekiel, Elijah, or Elisha. Because they weren't baptized either, nor was John the Baptist, and according to your theory they would have been in Spirit Prison (or did John the Baptist baptize himself, like Alma?). In fact, the vast majority of the human race, including children who were accountable before they died, would have been in Spirit Prison and not Paradise, no matter how good they had been in mortality. If your theory is correct.

I've been a member of this church for nearly 50 years, and this is the absolute first time I've ever heard that the entry ticket to the Paradise side of the Spirit World is baptism, at least from a Latter-day Saint. One sometimes thinks one has heard it all, but clearly I had not. Thanks for adding to my list of astonishingly unexpected novelties!

I got the idea from the apostles. I don’t particularly like this teaching.

Here is the church’s gospel topic bit on paradise: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics/paradise?lang=eng

It is short. I will just copy it here:

Quote

 

Paradise is the part of the spirit world in which the righteous spirits who have departed from this life await the Resurrection. It is a condition of happiness and peace.

In the scriptures⁠, the word paradise is used in different ways. First, as mentioned above, it designates a place of peace and happiness in the postmortal spirit world⁠, reserved for those who have been baptized and who have remained faithful.^⁠ Those in spirit prison have the opportunity to learn the gospel of Jesus Christ⁠, repent of their sins, and receive the ordinances of baptism and confirmation through the work we do in temples⁠.^⁠ If they accept the gospel and their temple work has been done, they may enter paradise.

A second use of the word paradise is found in Luke’s account of the Savior’s Crucifixion. When Jesus was on the cross, a thief who also was being crucified said, “Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.”^⁠ The Lord replied, “Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise.”^⁠The Prophet Joseph Smith explained that this is a mistranslation; the Lord actually said that the thief would be with Him in the world of spirits.

The word paradise also sometimes refers to the celestial kingdom⁠.^⁠ In the tenth article of faith, the word paradisiacal describes the earth’s glory in the Millennium⁠.

Bolding mine.

Also Joseph Smith’s claim that that is a mistranslation doesn’t make any linguistic sense. It might be a more accurate description but the Greek doesn’t refer to a world of spirit. The word is almost certainly used to compare it to Eden.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

Here is some of President Smith's description of what happened when Christ arrived in the Spirit World:

D&C 138:19 And there he preached to them the everlasting gospel, the doctrine of the resurrection and the redemption of mankind from the fall, and from individual sins on conditions of repentance.
20 But unto the wicked he did not go, and among the ungodly and the unrepentant who had defiled themselves while in the flesh, his voice was not raised;
21 Neither did the rebellious who rejected the testimonies and the warnings of the ancient prophets behold his presence, nor look upon his face.

Christ did not go to Spirit Prison, only Paradise. If those in Paradise had been baptized, then He would have had no reason to preach resurrection, redemption, or repentance from sin, because they would already have known all about it. And, let's see, how many humans had been baptized to that point in human history? Christ would have been preaching to a very small, select crowd indeed.

Did every dispensation know of resurrection and redemption? Even if they did I am constantly being taught about redemption and resurrection even though I have heard it before. Also if somehow the unbaptized are in paradise surely the faithful saints would have tried to teach them? Maybe.

I suspect it was a small crowd compared to the volume of people in the spirit world. It is even possible that some of them were morose or unmotivated. It talks about them seeing their lack of a resurrection as a form of bondage. Maybe they weren’t well organized or weren’t sure what they should be doing. Joseph Smith taught that John the Baptist went there as a forerunner for Jesus again. No idea what that means.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

And note that it says that the ones he did not go to were the wicked, not the unbaptized. 

I am going off what the Church teaches. I would like to think the unbaptized can go to paradise. I’d kind of like everyone to go there. Except Frank. That guy can burn for eternity.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

That's because the Catholics don't know anything about the three kingdoms of glory, but mistake Paradise for the final destination of the righteous. They think that the repentant thief was going to Heaven, not to an intermediary place. And they think that the unrepentant thief was going to Hell, not to an intermediary place. 

Mostly because the three kingdoms didn’t make it into the Bible. Hard to blame them for not knowing.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

They're wrong, of course.

I don't think it is generally understood that everything ever said in General Conference is unadulterated truth, or never misunderstood by the listeners. Or perhaps Brigham's "Adam-God Doctrine" really is a fundamental truth and we better start teaching it again. Include it in the temple recommend questions, perhaps.

I hope what I suspect about how things work is wrong.

On 5/10/2025 at 11:36 AM, Stargazer said:

What rhyme or reason do you want? They all have to be proxy baptized at some point, anyway, right? We baptize every single person we find in our family tree, don't we? Even if we didn't like them? Well, you may have ancestors you disliked, but I don't. The vast majority of them I've never met. Yet I didn't stop to enquire if they were worthy of being baptized.

Do you have a problem with those on your list there? Shouldn't we baptize them? If we shouldn't, why not? I have some knowledge of the life of all of them. Are any of them evil? I don't think so. And even if they were, does being evil remove one from the list of those whom we should baptize by proxy? Now, I understand that every single one of those people in your list were sinners. No exceptions! Have any repented since they entered the Spirit World? I have no idea, but it's not for me to judge, is it?

Do you have a problem with those on the list?

Nope, no problem with the names themselves. Just seems an odd grab bag of people to choose across various elements of society when the Founders were said to have impressed their names specifically.

And yes, everyone does need to be baptized. I was taught it was urgent because it allows these people to escape prison. Like, when you did it they could opt to get out. Again, I don’t like this teaching. I just don’t see a way around it. Most attempts to reason around it are appeals to compassion and the love of God and ‘God wouldn’t do that’ reasoning. It is also offered as a kind of comfort to grieving families and to avoid people worrying about people they love being in unhappy circumstances. I am sympathetic to those arguments but the teachings don’t seem to back up this soft-pedaling.

Edited May 11, 2025 by The Nehor

[GoCeltics]

On 5/9/2025 at 10:28 AM, Stargazer said:

Misery loves company?

A good example would have been if the rich man wanted his five brothers to come and keep him company.

Edited May 14, 2025 by GoCeltics

[Stargazer]

On 5/11/2025 at 4:07 PM, The Nehor said:

I just don’t think that being in a place that is called Spirit Prison would be indicative of a loving God. You could still potentially reason your way to one but I don’t think it would be intuitive.

Humans do possess brains (and I suppose corresponding spirit brains) that can logically deduce things from limited information, and at least consider that something is possible that was previously thought impossible, because an expected result turned out not to have happened after all. Such as dying, and instead of nothingness, finding oneself still conscious in a realm with others who had died and retained their consciousnesses. It might or might not be intuitive, but it might still be indicative. Even in Spirit Prison it seems that an evil atheist might feel that he might have been wrong about his fundamental views on existence. Especially when the missionaries show up and start telling him that there is a better place to be, but he would have to repent of what he had done in order to go there. 

We are kind of arguing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, of course, since we have no idea what "life" is like in the Spirit World, in either portion. We don't know the conditions, so we're speculating and reasoning from ignorance. 

The story of Victor Belenko kind of illustrates the matter, I think. He was a Soviet Air Force pilot stationed in the Soviet Far East. He had grown dissatisfied with the Soviet Union and its many contradictions, and during a training flight flew his MiG 25 Foxbat to Japan, where he defected. He was quickly brought to the US, but found it difficult to adjust to conditions. When his CIA handler took him to a typical US supermarket, for instance, he initially believed that it was a deceptive "showplace" intended to serve as a kind of "Potemkin village" because of the quantities, selections, and quality of consumer goods available were simply too good. Just like in the USSR. It wasn't until he was given his own car and allowed to go where he wanted by himself that he finally believed that things were actually how they were advertised. Early on, his Soviet expectations showed because when he was first driving on US roads he was pulled over by the police for speeding, and confidently told his handler, "I know how to deal with this!" and attempted to bribe the policeman -- because that's what was commonly done in the USSR to deal with the police on minor matters. The handler had to intervene to stop the matter from escalating.

 

[Stargazer]

On 5/11/2025 at 4:07 PM, The Nehor said:

Maybe. I am cynical and pessimistic though. Maybe death makes people think more clearly?

Much like removal of negative stimuli provides relief from pain, death ought to provide some relief from the physical limitations imposed by the errors or depredations of one's mortal brain, which one is no longer saddled with. Does a person suffering from, say, chronic depression remain depressed in the Spirit World without the physical brain chemistry that caused the depression? Gosh, I hope not, because I don't think Xanax is available as a spirit drug.

I wouldn't say that death makes people think more clearly so much as it removes whatever physical blocks, inherent or acquired, that might have been preventing it. 

[Stargazer]

On 5/11/2025 at 4:07 PM, The Nehor said:

I got the idea from the apostles. I don’t particularly like this teaching.

I agree with you, and I don't like it at all. I believe it is incorrect. Apostles have also been known to get some things wrong. E.g. the issue of the priesthood vs black people: "Soon after the June 1978 revelation that ended the restriction, Elder Bruce R. McConkie declared: 'Forget everything that I have said, or what President Brigham Young or President George Q. Cannon or whomsoever has said in days past that is contrary to the present revelation. We spoke with a limited understanding and without the light and knowledge that now has come.'”

On 5/11/2025 at 4:07 PM, The Nehor said:

Here is the church’s gospel topic bit on paradise: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics/paradise?lang=eng

I will point out that just because it's on the church website does not make it canonized or completely reliable as to doctrine.

If when Jesus was baptized there were only baptized people there, there was virtually nobody in Paradise when he arrived. The only baptisms ("in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost") before John the Baptist's ministry that I am aware of from scripture were of Adam (and probably Eve), and apparently a lot of Nephites. There is no mention of baptism for any of the OT prophets. The Old Testament does not make any sort of deal about baptism. It happens that 1 Nephi 20:1 quotes Isaiah 48:1, which refers to "the waters of Judah," and extends it to "or... the waters of baptism." But do we know what this means? 

It happens that Jews may be routinely baptized, but it isn't baptism as we know it. I'm speaking of the Jewish rite of water purification (mikveh) that is a rite undertaken occasionally for various reasons, and depending upon circumstances or piety, a lot of times. Read the linked article for more info. Born Jews do not undertake to be baptized to become a Jew, though it is required for a gentile who wishes to convert. It isn't baptism, as such. It isn't required for salvation from sin.

Who met Jesus when he appeared upon the scene after his death on the cross? 

D&C 138:12,13 -> And there were gathered together in one place an innumerable company of the spirits of the just, who had been faithful in the testimony of Jesus while they lived in mortality; And who had offered sacrifice in the similitude of the great sacrifice of the Son of God, and had suffered tribulation in their Redeemer’s name.

Note carefully that the word baptism does not occur among the qualifications for meeting Jesus in Paradise when he arrived there. Note too, that the number of them was "innumerable," meaning too many to count. Were they innumerable who were baptized in mortality prior to John the Baptist's ministry? 

Note also the description of who it was in Spirit Prison, where the Lord did not go: D&C 138:20,21 -> But unto the wicked he did not go, and among the ungodly and the unrepentant who had defiled themselves while in the flesh, his voice was not raised; Neither did the rebellious who rejected the testimonies and the warnings of the ancient prophets behold his presence, nor look upon his face.

Note that it wasn't to the unbaptized that he did not go. It was the wicked and rebellious who did not see his face. Does a child who dies at age 10 but who has been perfectly well-behaved to that point go to Spirit Prison? I hope not.

The article on the church website about Paradise and the requirements for being there do not, in my humble opinion, reflect the scriptures nor the mercy of God. 

On 5/11/2025 at 4:07 PM, The Nehor said:

It is short. I will just copy it here:

Quote

 

Paradise is the part of the spirit world in which the righteous spirits who have departed from this life await the Resurrection. It is a condition of happiness and peace.

In the scriptures⁠, the word paradise is used in different ways. First, as mentioned above, it designates a place of peace and happiness in the postmortal spirit world⁠, reserved for those who have been baptized and who have remained faithful.^⁠ Those in spirit prison have the opportunity to learn the gospel of Jesus Christ⁠, repent of their sins, and receive the ordinances of baptism and confirmation through the work we do in temples⁠.^⁠ If they accept the gospel and their temple work has been done, they may enter paradise.

A second use of the word paradise is found in Luke’s account of the Savior’s Crucifixion. When Jesus was on the cross, a thief who also was being crucified said, “Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.”^⁠ The Lord replied, “Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise.”^⁠The Prophet Joseph Smith explained that this is a mistranslation; the Lord actually said that the thief would be with Him in the world of spirits.

The word paradise also sometimes refers to the celestial kingdom⁠.^⁠ In the tenth article of faith, the word paradisiacal describes the earth’s glory in the Millennium⁠.

Expand  

Bolding mine.

Also Joseph Smith’s claim that that is a mistranslation doesn’t make any linguistic sense. It might be a more accurate description but the Greek doesn’t refer to a world of spirit. The word is almost certainly used to compare it to Eden.

What Joseph meant by translation is probably not what we mean by translation. He did not translate the Book of Mormon. It was transmitted to him. I'm somewhat of a student of Bart Ehrman, who lost his faith partly as a result of his discovery that the Greek scriptures were not at all inerrant, as he had supposed. I trust the Old and New Testament only as far as I can throw them. By which I mean that they were certainly mistransmitted in many cases, and then the mistransmissions were mistranslated in others. False addenda were inserted, valid text removed, and entire books lost. Much of the New Testament, for example, are literal letters to certain congregations in some cases expressing Paul's opinions about cultural matters that we reject (long hair for men, women speaking in churches, etc). I accept the Bible as far as it is translated correctly, but even then, only as far as it was transmitted correctly, and for verification I use modern revelation. Which modern revelation supersedes the Bible, in my view. 

 

[Notatbm]

On 5/8/2025 at 6:33 PM, nuclearfuels said:

Looking for your speculation, educated guesses, etc. as I understand we don't currently know.

When loved ones die, I imagine their grandparents, great aunts, great uncles, spouses, etc. are there to welcome them into the spirit world.

How do they know when the home-going party will be? How do they know when to welcome the living into the spirit world?

They must be told, I suppose, by those who know the upcoming time of death, no? Otherwise how would they leave their missionary work to be at a home-going party?

Who would know the time: God who would tell Jesus who would tell the Quorum of the Twelve, who would tell the General Authorities, who'd tell the Area Authorities, who'd tell the mission presidencies and stake presidencies who'd tell the ward and branch leaders who'd tell the...?...home-teachers, visiting sisters, ministering brothers, ministering sisters, or tell the grandparents, great aunts, great uncles, spouses, etc. directly? 

Or do the grandparents, great aunts, great uncles, spouses, etc. simply know when their loved ones will pass away because they are often near us, or often visit us?

 

Last i heard Joseph Smith is the decider (per Brigham Young) as to who gets into the celestial kingdom. Sounds like he is at least the first in the chain of command to welcome/greet the new arrivals. Of course he could just send a representative to bring someone through the veil so who knows really:

"No man or woman in this dispensation will ever enter into the celestial kingdom of God without the consent of Joseph Smith… He reigns there as supreme a being in his sphere, capacity and calling, as God does in Heaven" - Journal of Discourses, Vol.14, p.203

[JAHS]

On 5/11/2025 at 8:07 AM, The Nehor said:

I just don’t think that being in a place that is called Spirit Prison would be indicative of a loving God. You could still potentially reason your way to one but I don’t think it would be intuitive.

Is Spirit Prison really a place? Could be we will all be together in the same place but spirit prison is more a state of mind and/or spirit where people have distanced themselves spiritually from God.  

[longview]

1 hour ago, JAHS said:

Is Spirit Prison really a place? Could be we will all be together in the same place but spirit prison is more a state of mind and/or spirit where people have distanced themselves spiritually from God.  

Spirit prison is definitely a distinct place which Jesus in His parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (see Luke 16:19 - 31) described as a place of torment. There is also a place of rest for the righteous (Jesus said to the penitent thief on the cross: "today you will be with me in Paradise"). Jesus said in the parable that "there is a great gulf fixed" between the two places.

President Joseph F. Smith in 1918 received a powerful vision which described Jesus' visit with the righteous in the place of rest (a state between mortal death and the subsequent resurrection). Jesus did NOT go among the wicked and disobedient but He did organize missionary forces from among the righteous to carry the light of the Gospel to those sitting in darkness. See D&C 138.

Here is James E. Talmage's commentary on the parable (I have highlighted portions in red):

Quote

33. The Master gave as a further lesson the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus

34. There was a certain rich man, which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day: And there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate, full of sores, And desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table: moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried; And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame. But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented. And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence. Then he said, I pray thee therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him to my father's house: For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. And he said, Nay, father Abraham; but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead. [975]

35. The afflicted beggar is honored with a name; the other is designated simply as "a certain rich man." [976] The two are presented as the extremes of contrast between wealth and destitution. The rich man was clothed in the costliest attire, purple and fine linen; and his every-day fare was a sumptuous feast. Lazarus had been brought to the gates of the rich man's palace, and there left, a helpless mendicant, his body covered with sores. The rich man was attended by servitors ready to gratify his slightest desire; the poor beggar at his gates had neither companions nor attendants except the dogs, which like himself waited for the refuse from the rich man's table. Such is the picture of the two in life. An abrupt change of scene brings into view the same two on the far side of the veil that hangs between the here and the hereafter. Lazarus died; no mention is made of his funeral; his festering body was probably thrown into a pauper's grave; but angels bore his immortal spirit into Paradise, the resting place of the blessed and commonly known in the figurative lore of the rabbis as Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died; his burial was doubtless an elaborate affair, but we read not of any angelic escort receiving his spirit. In hell he lifted up his eyes and saw, afar, Lazarus at peace in the abode of Abraham.

36. As a Jew the man had often boasted of having Abraham for his father; and now the wretched spirit appealed to the patriarch of his race by the paternal address, "Father Abraham," and asked only the boon of a single drop of water to be placed on his parched tongue; this he prayed that Lazarus, the erstwhile beggar, might bring. The reply throws light on certain conditions existing in the spirit world, though as in the use of parables generally, the presentation is largely figurative. Addressing the poor tormented spirit as "Son," Abraham reminded him of all the good things he had kept for himself on earth, whilst Lazarus had lain a suffering, neglected beggar at his gates; now by the operation of divine law, Lazarus had received recompense, and he, retribution. Moreover, to grant his pitiful request was impossible, for between the abode of the righteous where Lazarus rested and that of the wicked where he suffered "there is a great gulf fixed," and passage between the two is interdicted. The next request of the miserable sufferer was not wholly selfish; in his anguish he remembered those from whom he had been separated by death, fain would he save his brothers from the fate he had met; and he prayed that Lazarus be sent back to earth to visit the ancestral home, and warn those selfish, pleasure-seeking, and yet mortal brothers, of the awful doom awaiting them except they would repent and reform. There may have been in this petition an insinuation that had he been sufficiently warned he would have done better, and would have escaped the torment. To the reminder that they had the words of Moses and the prophets, which they should obey, he replied that if one went to them from the dead they would surely repent. Abraham answered that if they would not heed Moses and the prophets neither would "they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead."

37. In any attempt to interpret the parable as a whole or definitely apply any of its parts, we should bear in mind that it was addressed to the Pharisees as an instructive rebuke for the derision and scorn with which they had received the Lord's warning concerning the dangers attending servitude to mammon. Jesus employed Jewish metaphors, and the imagery of the parable is such as would most directly appeal to the official expounders of Moses and the prophets. While as a practice it would be critically unfair to deduce doctrinal principles from parabolic incidents, we cannot admit that Christ would teach falsely even in parable; and therefore we accept as true the portrayal of conditions in the world of the disembodied. That righteous and unrighteous dwell apart during the interval between death and resurrection is clear. Paradise, or as the Jews like to designate that blessed abode, "Abraham's bosom," is not the place of final glory, any more than the hell to which the rich man's spirit was consigned is the final habitation of the condemned. [977] To that preliminary or intermediate state, however, men's works do follow them [978] and the dead shall surely find that their abode is that for which they have qualified themselves while in the flesh.

38. The rich man's fate was not the effect of riches, nor was the rest into which Lazarus entered the resultant of poverty. Failure to use his wealth aright, and selfish satisfaction with the sensuous enjoyment of earthly things to the exclusion of all concern for the needs or privations of his fellows, brought the one under condemnation; while patience in suffering, faith in God and such righteous life as is implied though not expressed, insured happiness to the other. The proud self-sufficiency of the rich man, who lacked nothing that wealth could furnish, and who kept aloof from the needy and suffering, was his besetting sin. The aloofness of the Pharisees, on which indeed they prided themselves, as their very name, signifying "separatists," expressed, was thus condemned. The parable teaches the continuation of individual existence after death, and the relation of cause to effect between the life one leads in mortality and the state awaiting him beyond.

There was a good reason for Jesus using the name of Lazarus in the parable. It is the name of the beloved brother of Mary and Martha that had lain in the tomb for four days. Lazarus most likely was in the place of rest before he was called back by Jesus. The opponents of Jesus were furious at the miracle of Lazarus and STILL rejected the testimonies of both Jesus and the actual Lazarus!

Edited May 18, 2025 by longview

[JAHS]

2 hours ago, longview said:

Spirit prison is definitely a distinct place which Jesus in His parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (see Luke 16:19 - 31) described as a place of torment. There is also a place of rest for the righteous (Jesus said to the penitent thief on the cross: "today you will be with me in Paradise"). Jesus said in the parable that "there is a great gulf fixed" between the two places.

President Joseph F. Smith in 1918 received a powerful vision which described Jesus' visit with the righteous in the place of rest (a state between mortal death and the subsequent resurrection). Jesus did NOT go among the wicked and disobedient but He did organize missionary forces from among the righteous to carry the light of the Gospel to those sitting in darkness. See D&C 138.

Joseph Smith said the following:

"I will say something about the spirits in prison. There has been much said by modern divines about the words of Jesus (when on the cross) to the thief, saying, 'This day shalt thou be with me in paradise. 'King James' translators make it out to say paradise. But what is paradise? It is a modern word: it does not answer at all to the original word that Jesus made use of. . . . There is nothing in the original word in Greek from which this was taken that signifies paradise; but it was-This day thou shalt be with me in the world of spirits. Hades, the Greek or Sheol, the Hebrew, these two significations mean a world of spirits. Hades, Sheol, paradise, spirits in prison, are all one: it is a world of spirits." (Teachings, pp. 309, 310)

So it is a world of spirits rather than specifically Paradise and spirit prison. I suppose there could still be some kind of separation within the world of spirits. We say that Jesus bridged the gap between the two places so maybe they aren't as separate now as they were before Jesus got there.

[Calm]

8 hours ago, longview said:

Spirit prison is definitely a distinct place which Jesus in His parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus

A parable…a story which uses symbols.  

Why assume that in this case the symbolic location is also a real one?

Edited May 18, 2025 by Calm

[The Nehor]

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

I agree with you, and I don't like it at all. I believe it is incorrect. Apostles have also been known to get some things wrong. E.g. the issue of the priesthood vs black people: "Soon after the June 1978 revelation that ended the restriction, Elder Bruce R. McConkie declared: 'Forget everything that I have said, or what President Brigham Young or President George Q. Cannon or whomsoever has said in days past that is contrary to the present revelation. We spoke with a limited understanding and without the light and knowledge that now has come.'”

I am not sure if it is correct but it is definitely taught in scripture and in church materials. Generally it gets soft-pedaled when taught in Church classes and a lot of people start talking about degrees of Spirit Prison and the like.

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

I will point out that just because it's on the church website does not make it canonized or completely reliable as to doctrine.

I have heard apostles and other church leaders teach this repeatedly. It is not a one-off thing in an online article.

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

If when Jesus was baptized there were only baptized people there, there was virtually nobody in Paradise when he arrived. The only baptisms ("in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost") before John the Baptist's ministry that I am aware of from scripture were of Adam (and probably Eve), and apparently a lot of Nephites. There is no mention of baptism for any of the OT prophets. The Old Testament does not make any sort of deal about baptism. It happens that 1 Nephi 20:1 quotes Isaiah 48:1, which refers to "the waters of Judah," and extends it to "or... the waters of baptism." But do we know what this means? 

It happens that Jews may be routinely baptized, but it isn't baptism as we know it. I'm speaking of the Jewish rite of water purification (mikveh) that is a rite undertaken occasionally for various reasons, and depending upon circumstances or piety, a lot of times. Read the linked article for more info. Born Jews do not undertake to be baptized to become a Jew, though it is required for a gentile who wishes to convert. It isn't baptism, as such. It isn't required for salvation from sin.

It is possible other ordinances filled this gap. LDS theology doesn’t really give an explanation for how baptism existed in the beginning and then appears to have been lost and only relatively recently been brought back.

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

Who met Jesus when he appeared upon the scene after his death on the cross? 

D&C 138:12,13 -> And there were gathered together in one place an innumerable company of the spirits of the just, who had been faithful in the testimony of Jesus while they lived in mortality; And who had offered sacrifice in the similitude of the great sacrifice of the Son of God, and had suffered tribulation in their Redeemer’s name.

Doesn’t sound like just generic good people though.

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

Note carefully that the word baptism does not occur among the qualifications for meeting Jesus in Paradise when he arrived there. Note too, that the number of them was "innumerable," meaning too many to count. Were they innumerable who were baptized in mortality prior to John the Baptist's ministry?

No idea.

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

Note also the description of who it was in Spirit Prison, where the Lord did not go: D&C 138:20,21 -> But unto the wicked he did not go, and among the ungodly and the unrepentant who had defiled themselves while in the flesh, his voice was not raised; Neither did the rebellious who rejected the testimonies and the warnings of the ancient prophets behold his presence, nor look upon his face.

It seems like there really needs to be a space between the two extremes but we don’t get one.

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

Note that it wasn't to the unbaptized that he did not go. It was the wicked and rebellious who did not see his face. Does a child who dies at age 10 but who has been perfectly well-behaved to that point go to Spirit Prison? I hope not.

Augustine wasn’t gleeful at the thought of unbaptized babies being damned. He just couldn’t find a way around it. I can’t find another way around this.

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

The article on the church website about Paradise and the requirements for being there do not, in my humble opinion, reflect the scriptures nor the mercy of God. 

Be careful. Next you might wonder why God condemns queer people or argue that God’s justice is incompatible with all kinds of things.

On 5/17/2025 at 8:44 AM, Stargazer said:

What Joseph meant by translation is probably not what we mean by translation. He did not translate the Book of Mormon. It was transmitted to him. I'm somewhat of a student of Bart Ehrman, who lost his faith partly as a result of his discovery that the Greek scriptures were not at all inerrant, as he had supposed. I trust the Old and New Testament only as far as I can throw them. By which I mean that they were certainly mistransmitted in many cases, and then the mistransmissions were mistranslated in others. False addenda were inserted, valid text removed, and entire books lost. Much of the New Testament, for example, are literal letters to certain congregations in some cases expressing Paul's opinions about cultural matters that we reject (long hair for men, women speaking in churches, etc). I accept the Bible as far as it is translated correctly, but even then, only as far as it was transmitted correctly, and for verification I use modern revelation. Which modern revelation supersedes the Bible, in my view. 

I don’t accept that the Bible was somehow pure when first recorded and then corrupted. We have to keep moving the goal posts to some brilliant moments during and after the life of Jesus where the pure gospel was present and then quickly lost. Compare to our dispensation with its “line upon line” reasoning and figuring it out as we go. Whole concepts have been tossed. Dynastic sealings, rebaptism, all kinds of stuff was found wanting and left behind. Yet we want to push some perfection on past dispensations from the start. Seems a huge stretch.

I’ve read too much of the early Christians trying to figure out what Jesus meant to think that at one point everyone agreed on one understanding. It instead has the feverish feeling of a group of people following a messiah who seemed to fail on most of the required messianic promises so they were forced to move their fulfillment to some future date and trying to figure out what the messiah accomplished. It is messy.

[The Nehor]

13 hours ago, JAHS said:

Joseph Smith said the following:

"I will say something about the spirits in prison. There has been much said by modern divines about the words of Jesus (when on the cross) to the thief, saying, 'This day shalt thou be with me in paradise. 'King James' translators make it out to say paradise. But what is paradise? It is a modern word: it does not answer at all to the original word that Jesus made use of. . . . There is nothing in the original word in Greek from which this was taken that signifies paradise; but it was-This day thou shalt be with me in the world of spirits. Hades, the Greek or Sheol, the Hebrew, these two significations mean a world of spirits. Hades, Sheol, paradise, spirits in prison, are all one: it is a world of spirits." (Teachings, pp. 309, 310)

So it is a world of spirits rather than specifically Paradise and spirit prison. I suppose there could still be some kind of separation within the world of spirits. We say that Jesus bridged the gap between the two places so maybe they aren't as separate now as they were before Jesus got there.

Joseph Smith was wrong in a linguistic sense. The word translated as paradise refers to a kind of garden. It is a reference to Eden. In other words, a kind of paradise.

Hades is in the Bible but not in that passage. Sheol is the final fate of the dead in earlier Judaism. It is not a nice place but there was no divide between paradise and prison. Everyone went there. There are hints of some having it slightly better there but it is not a happy afterlife. Sheol and Hades usually just mean where the dead go but neither of those are used when Jesus speaks to the thief. “This day shalt thou be with me in Hades” would convey what Joseph Smith suggests but it’s not the word used.

Did Joseph have revelatory power to understand what Jesus actually meant in this specific instance? Maybe, but you won’t get it by learning Greek or Hebrew and reading the New Testament.

[The Nehor]

15 hours ago, longview said:

There was a good reason for Jesus using the name of Lazarus in the parable. It is the name of the beloved brother of Mary and Martha that had lain in the tomb for four days. Lazarus most likely was in the place of rest before he was called back by Jesus. The opponents of Jesus were furious at the miracle of Lazarus and STILL rejected the testimonies of both Jesus and the actual Lazarus!

Lazarus was likely very young. He lived with his sisters yet it is not referred to as his house and this was a patriarchal society so he was probably not yet of age. I think it is more likely Jesus used his name for a character because it would make the kid feel amazing to be in one of the parables.

[longview]

On 5/18/2025 at 3:45 AM, Calm said:

A parable…a story which uses symbols.  

Why assume that in this case the symbolic location is also a real one?

You must have missed the reference to D&C 138. The symbolism is substantiated to such an extent that the parallels between the parable and the vision is fully "fleshed out" in the structural sense.

[longview]

On 5/18/2025 at 11:36 AM, The Nehor said:

Lazarus was likely very young. He lived with his sisters yet it is not referred to as his house and this was a patriarchal society so he was probably not yet of age. I think it is more likely Jesus used his name for a character because it would make the kid feel amazing to be in one of the parables.

There you go . . . way off into the weeds . . . 

[The Nehor]

4 hours ago, longview said:

There you go . . . way off into the weeds . . . 

And everyone else including yourself was laser focused on the original topic until I blundered in and went on a tangent!!!!

How will I live with the shame?!?!?!?!

[Stargazer]

On 5/18/2025 at 1:28 AM, JAHS said:

Is Spirit Prison really a place? Could be we will all be together in the same place but spirit prison is more a state of mind and/or spirit where people have distanced themselves spiritually from God.  

Joseph F. Smith's revelation (D&C 138) seems to suggest that it is a place. See verses 19 and 20 and surrounding text... 

"And there he preached to them the everlasting gospel, the doctrine of the resurrection and the redemption of mankind from the fall, and from individual sins on conditions of repentance. But unto the wicked he did not go, and among the ungodly and the unrepentant who had defiled themselves while in the flesh, his voice was not raised;"

The terms suggest locality, not mere state. That being said, I know no more than anyone else about how things work there. But if the words in the revelation reflect the situation accurately...

[Stargazer]

On 5/18/2025 at 5:09 AM, JAHS said:

So it is a world of spirits rather than specifically Paradise and spirit prison. I suppose there could still be some kind of separation within the world of spirits. We say that Jesus bridged the gap between the two places so maybe they aren't as separate now as they were before Jesus got there.

I suggest a re-reading of D&C 138. President Smith was very clear about the separation, and as for "bridging the gap," Jesus did so by setting apart messengers and sending them to that side. He describes the disparate conditions there in verse 22, where he writes: "Where these were, darkness reigned, but among the righteous there was peace;". 

The terms "spirit prison" and "paradise" are not used. In 1 Peter 3:18-20 it is said that Jesus preached to the spirits in prison, but just as the Greek word for paradise seems to merely mean "place of spirits," it may refer to the spirit world generally and not to a particular place therein.

I think we like to differentiate the two sides by labelling them. It seems to be a useful practice. 

[Stargazer]

On 5/18/2025 at 6:22 PM, The Nehor said:

I am not sure if it is correct but it is definitely taught in scripture and in church materials. Generally it gets soft-pedaled when taught in Church classes and a lot of people start talking about degrees of Spirit Prison and the like.

I have heard apostles and other church leaders teach this repeatedly. It is not a one-off thing in an online article.

I'm right. Trust me. <- Just kidding. 

I'm not going to claim to have deeply researched this, but believe it or not, this thread was the very first place in my nearly 60 years of church membership that I had heard that only baptized people went to what we call Paradise. I'm not going to CFR you on this, as I am going to dig into this myself. But if you have any instant references to immediate hand, this would be welcome.

On 5/18/2025 at 6:22 PM, The Nehor said:

It is possible other ordinances filled this gap. LDS theology doesn’t really give an explanation for how baptism existed in the beginning and then appears to have been lost and only relatively recently been brought back.

I can't see how other ordinances could fill that gap. But perhaps so. As for explanation, apostasy can do it, of course, through loss of priesthood authority. 

I reflect upon Abraham in this context. He sacrificed, he paid tithes, he circumcised. All before the Law of Moses. But he didn't baptize. In fact, the only mention of baptism we have in pre-Restoration scripture is John the Baptist's activities. If baptism is so important that salvation depends upon it, it seems very odd that it wasn't mentioned until the New Testament gospels. 

On 5/18/2025 at 6:22 PM, The Nehor said:

Doesn’t sound like just generic good people though.

But it kind of does. D&C 138 tells us who was in the Spirit World's "bad place": "But unto the wicked he did not go, and among the ungodly and the unrepentant who had defiled themselves while in the flesh, his voice was not raised; Neither did the rebellious who rejected the testimonies and the warnings of the ancient prophets behold his presence, nor look upon his face." D&C 138:19,20

Was a person who died in, say, China around 100 BC (just to pick a semi-random year), who knew nothing about the gospel other than what his culture taught for morality, but who sought diligently to be as moral as he or she could, wicked, ungodly, unrepentant, rebellious, and rejecting? Was such a person only worthy of the darkness described in verse 22?

I don't think so, but of course I don't know.

On 5/18/2025 at 6:22 PM, The Nehor said:

No idea.

It seems like there really needs to be a space between the two extremes but we don’t get one.

Augustine wasn’t gleeful at the thought of unbaptized babies being damned. He just couldn’t find a way around it. I can’t find another way around this.

Be careful. Next you might wonder why God condemns queer people or argue that God’s justice is incompatible with all kinds of things.

Actually, I don't think God condemns queer people. 

As for justice, it's not really God's. He Himself is bound by eternal law. 

On 5/18/2025 at 6:22 PM, The Nehor said:

I don’t accept that the Bible was somehow pure when first recorded and then corrupted.

Well, I don't either. Isaiah 55:8,9 is very clear that God's mind is very far above ours. That means that is virtually impossible for us to come up with a pure scripture. We start with a poor substitute for perfection, and then having received that, we go on to misunderstand and mistransmit it. I can speak German fairly fluently. Sometimes in conversation what I mean to say can only be accurately expressed using a German word or expression. The corresponding English words may come close but doesn't quite hit the nail on the head. The reverse is sometimes also the case. I imagine that God's own words can only be transmitted to us in our limited languages imperfectly. His thoughts are not our thoughts.

When Paul wrote his letters to the various congregations he may have misunderstood certain aspects of the Gospel, and may have stated some things as if they were doctrine, when they were nothing more than cultural norms. So, obviously we started sometimes with misunderstandings, and then went on to completely screw it up. 

On 5/18/2025 at 6:22 PM, The Nehor said:

We have to keep moving the goal posts to some brilliant moments during and after the life of Jesus where the pure gospel was present and then quickly lost. Compare to our dispensation with its “line upon line” reasoning and figuring it out as we go. Whole concepts have been tossed. Dynastic sealings, rebaptism, all kinds of stuff was found wanting and left behind. Yet we want to push some perfection on past dispensations from the start. Seems a huge stretch.

I’ve read too much of the early Christians trying to figure out what Jesus meant to think that at one point everyone agreed on one understanding. It instead has the feverish feeling of a group of people following a messiah who seemed to fail on most of the required messianic promises so they were forced to move their fulfillment to some future date and trying to figure out what the messiah accomplished. It is messy.

I am reminded of the words of the Anglican cleric, John Donne, who in a sermon once said: "How poore, how narrow, how impious a measure of God, is this, that he must doe, as thou wouldest doe, if thou wert God." 

We do the best we can with what we have. Fortunately, we are not condemned to hell because we think the righteous dead are sent to Spirit Prison just because they weren't baptized in life, and only get to come to Paradise if and when someone baptizes them by proxy. 

In the end, it all works out.

[manol]

5 hours ago, Stargazer said:

Joseph F. Smith's revelation (D&C 138) seems to suggest that it is a place. See verses 19 and 20 and surrounding text... 

"And there he preached to them the everlasting gospel, the doctrine of the resurrection and the redemption of mankind from the fall, and from individual sins on conditions of repentance. But unto the wicked he did not go, and among the ungodly and the unrepentant who had defiled themselves while in the flesh, his voice was not raised;"

The terms suggest locality, not mere state. That being said, I know no more than anyone else about how things work there. But if the words in the revelation reflect the situation accurately...

We really don't know of course, as you say, but here's a hypothetical scenario to illustrate how state, rather than locality, can be what really matters:  Imagine you and I are sitting next to each other watching General Conference. You are really into the talk being given and I'm getting angrier and angrier by the minute over something I don't like about it.  Which one of us will God the Holy Spirit go to?  Which one of us will hear the voice of God the Holy Spirit?  

And if we trade locations, would that make any difference?  Of course not!   At the risk of oversimplifying, the difference is that I have chosen to "tune in" to the low spiritual energy of judgment and grievance, and you have chosen to "tune in" to the high spiritual energy of receptiveness.  It's like I've tuned my radio to Gwar, and you've tuned your radio to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing Handel's Messiah.  In other words state, rather than locality, is what matters here. 

Edited May 22, 2025 by manol

[webbles]

1 hour ago, Stargazer said:

I'm not going to claim to have deeply researched this, but believe it or not, this thread was the very first place in my nearly 60 years of church membership that I had heard that only baptized people went to what we call Paradise. I'm not going to CFR you on this, as I am going to dig into this myself. But if you have any instant references to immediate hand, this would be welcome.

We actually had a thread on this a while ago.  There were several ideas put forth on whether or not it is really doctrinal, or how does it work with those with no record of baptism but probably are in Paradise.

 

[Calm]

14 hours ago, Stargazer said:

'm not going to claim to have deeply researched this, but believe it or not, this thread was the very first place in my nearly 60 years of church membership that I had heard that only baptized people went to what we call Paradise. I'm not going to CFR you on this, as I am going to dig into this myself. But if you have any instant references to immediate hand, this would be welcome

Since baptism is the first ordinance we receive, it seems logical that at the very least it is required to leave Spirit Prison according to what is our doctrine.

Quote

 In the spirit prison are the spirits of those who have not yet received the gospel of Jesus Christ. These spirits have agency and may be enticed by both good and evil. If they accept the gospel and the ordinances performed for them in the temples, they may leave the spirit prison and dwell in paradise.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-principles/chapter-41-the-postmortal-spirit-world?lang=eng

Edited May 23, 2025 by Calm

[The Nehor]

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

I'm right. Trust me. <- Just kidding. 

I'm not going to claim to have deeply researched this, but believe it or not, this thread was the very first place in my nearly 60 years of church membership that I had heard that only baptized people went to what we call Paradise. I'm not going to CFR you on this, as I am going to dig into this myself. But if you have any instant references to immediate hand, this would be welcome.

I didn’t learn it until I was in seminary. I was given a scripture chain “proving” it at some point but I don’t remember it. I have also twice heard apostles say that is how it works but it is hard to use that as evidence since they weren’t public recorded meetings and we are told not to use quotes from that type of meeting.

I know it was taught in the Gospel Principles manual we used for Gospel Essentials.

Every time I have heard it brought up it almost always ends up with discussions of degrees of spirit prison but that just seems to be a reasoned out thing and not something I can substantiate.

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

I can't see how other ordinances could fill that gap. But perhaps so. As for explanation, apostasy can do it, of course, through loss of priesthood authority. 

I am not sure they can. The Book of Mormon talks though about the Lamanites being baptized by the Holy Ghost and not realizing it. I have no idea how that ordinance worked. I have heard it as a theory but I am not convinced either way.

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

I reflect upon Abraham in this context. He sacrificed, he paid tithes, he circumcised. All before the Law of Moses. But he didn't baptize. In fact, the only mention of baptism we have in pre-Restoration scripture is John the Baptist's activities. If baptism is so important that salvation depends upon it, it seems very odd that it wasn't mentioned until the New Testament gospels.

I suspect it wasn’t practiced and was developed later. I am not sure how much I believe the Church’s back-dating baptism back to the beginning of the world. Then it vanishes and suddenly reappears? Why?

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

But it kind of does. D&C 138 tells us who was in the Spirit World's "bad place": "But unto the wicked he did not go, and among the ungodly and the unrepentant who had defiled themselves while in the flesh, his voice was not raised; Neither did the rebellious who rejected the testimonies and the warnings of the ancient prophets behold his presence, nor look upon his face." D&C 138:19,20

Was a person who died in, say, China around 100 BC (just to pick a semi-random year), who knew nothing about the gospel other than what his culture taught for morality, but who sought diligently to be as moral as he or she could, wicked, ungodly, unrepentant, rebellious, and rejecting? Was such a person only worthy of the darkness described in verse 22?

I don't think so, but of course I don't know.

I don’t know either. I don’t think most people deserve that but the gospel seems to suggest most do. I don’t really like this aspect of the gospel much.

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

As for justice, it's not really God's. He Himself is bound by eternal law.

I am not even sure what that means. It doesn’t sound like the God I want to worship though. At the mercy of laws that seem unfair to us (and Him?) and stuck with following them whether He likes them or not?

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

Well, I don't either. Isaiah 55:8,9 is very clear that God's mind is very far above ours. That means that is virtually impossible for us to come up with a pure scripture. We start with a poor substitute for perfection, and then having received that, we go on to misunderstand and mistransmit it. I can speak German fairly fluently. Sometimes in conversation what I mean to say can only be accurately expressed using a German word or expression. The corresponding English words may come close but doesn't quite hit the nail on the head. The reverse is sometimes also the case. I imagine that God's own words can only be transmitted to us in our limited languages imperfectly. His thoughts are not our thoughts.

True, but God also knows us humans and should be able to work around that to a degree. I have a hard time dealing with the idea that an essentially omniscient being can’t get His point across because His servants muck it up so much.

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

When Paul wrote his letters to the various congregations he may have misunderstood certain aspects of the Gospel, and may have stated some things as if they were doctrine, when they were nothing more than cultural norms. So, obviously we started sometimes with misunderstandings, and then went on to completely screw it up. 

I am reminded of the words of the Anglican cleric, John Donne, who in a sermon once said: "How poore, how narrow, how impious a measure of God, is this, that he must doe, as thou wouldest doe, if thou wert God." 

I wouldn’t do it the way God does. I am not arguing for it because i like the idea. It is just what has been taught to me by those I am supposed to believe have authority. Maybe they are wrong.

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

We do the best we can with what we have. Fortunately, we are not condemned to hell because we think the righteous dead are sent to Spirit Prison just because they weren't baptized in life, and only get to come to Paradise if and when someone baptizes them by proxy. 

In the end, it all works out.

Unless it doesn’t work out and someone ends up in hell. In my experience being in torment doesn’t get that much easier just through knowing that it will end eventually.

[Stargazer]

On 5/23/2025 at 7:49 AM, The Nehor said:

I didn’t learn it until I was in seminary. I was given a scripture chain “proving” it at some point but I don’t remember it. I have also twice heard apostles say that is how it works but it is hard to use that as evidence since they weren’t public recorded meetings and we are told not to use quotes from that type of meeting.

I can see why it might be taught. But when in D&C 138 it speaks of an innumerable number of people waiting for Jesus to come through into the Spirit World, how could they all have been baptized? 

On 5/23/2025 at 7:49 AM, The Nehor said:

I know it was taught in the Gospel Principles manual we used for Gospel Essentials.

Every time I have heard it brought up it almost always ends up with discussions of degrees of spirit prison but that just seems to be a reasoned out thing and not something I can substantiate.

Some of what I believe in connection with all this could be said to "reasoned out." The idea that there could be "degrees of spirit prison" doesn't seem outlandish at all, to me. In connection with this, I shall direct your attention to something Heber C. Kimball reported that Jedidiah M. Grant told him about a vision he had had not long before Grant's death. He indicated that there was a definite organization in the Spirit World:

"At President Grant’s funeral, President Kimball said: '[Brother Grant] said to me, [Brother] Heber, I have been into the spirit world two nights in succession, and, of all the dreads that ever came across me, the worst was to have to again return to my body, though I had to do it. But O, says he, the order and government that were there! When in the spirit world, I saw the order of righteous men and women; beheld them organized in their several grades, and there appeared to be no obstruction to my vision; I could see every man and woman in their grade and order. I looked to see whether there was any disorder there, but there was none; neither could I see any death nor any darkness, disorder or confusion. He said that the people he there saw were organized in family capacities; and when he looked at them he saw grade after grade, and all were organized and in perfect harmony'."

I found this in the Introduction to Family History student manual. The above is not canonized scripture, so it isn't quite authoritative. But it's there. 

On 5/23/2025 at 7:49 AM, The Nehor said:

I am not sure they can. The Book of Mormon talks though about the Lamanites being baptized by the Holy Ghost and not realizing it. I have no idea how that ordinance worked. I have heard it as a theory but I am not convinced either way.

The original 12 apostles hadn't yet received the Holy Ghost until Pentecost. Perhaps they received the ordinance from Jesus, but didn't receive the Spirit itself until then, but that's not written anywhere. 

On 5/23/2025 at 7:49 AM, The Nehor said:

I suspect it wasn’t practiced and was developed later. I am not sure how much I believe the Church’s back-dating baptism back to the beginning of the world. Then it vanishes and suddenly reappears? Why?

The vast majority of the human race will only learn about the gospel in the Spirit World. The vast majority will have never heard of Jesus Christ until they arrive there. This means that authoritative baptism performed in mortal life is very rare. Why it vanished? Did it? Apostasy, leading to ignorance, is the only answer I can come up with.

But on the other hand, there are some things we don't know about in the distant past because they were not documented, or not documented in surviving records. For example, have you heard of those odd bronze dodecahedrons that have been found throughout Europe? They are called "Roman dodecahedrons," though none have been found in the Roman heartland, in Italy. About 130 of them have been found. 

No-one has a clue what they were used for, because there's nothing written about them.

By the same token, people might have been baptizing in past eras, but because it was so commonplace nobody felt the need to write about it much. And for so many ancient cultures we have virtually no documentation. 

On 5/23/2025 at 7:49 AM, The Nehor said:

I don’t know either. I don’t think most people deserve that but the gospel seems to suggest most do. I don’t really like this aspect of the gospel much.

I am not even sure what that means. It doesn’t sound like the God I want to worship though. At the mercy of laws that seem unfair to us (and Him?) and stuck with following them whether He likes them or not?

If God were not bound by law, then could we trust him? If he were capricious, then how could we have faith in him?

Alma 42:22 -> "But there is a law given, and a punishment affixed, and a repentance granted; which repentance, mercy claimeth; otherwise, justice claimeth the creature and executeth the law, and the law inflicteth the punishment; if not so, the works of justice would be destroyed, and God would cease to be God." [emphasis added]

Quite a radical idea, that of God ceasing to be God. The thing is, once we've sinned, God cannot take us back. NOT "doesn't want to," but cannot take us back. Because we are unclean, and even after we've repented, the stain of our sins follow us. That's the whole justification and need for a savior, one who had never sinned himself, but nevertheless took on himself the punishment required for disobedience.

In the next verses, Alma lays out the whole law of the gospel in its entirety. I won't reproduce it here.

It is my understanding that having willingly suffered the punishment for sin, despite having no sin himself, Christ won for us the mercy to accept our repentance to make us as if we had not sinned. And being thus clean, we can return to the presence of God. While those who are required to suffer for their own sins cannot do so. They are "at one" with God, but are still unclean.

Consider Alma again:

And thus he shall bring salvation to all those who shall believe on his name; this being the intent of this last sacrifice, to bring about the bowels of mercy, which overpowereth justice, and bringeth about means unto men that they may have faith unto repentance. And thus mercy can satisfy the demands of justice, and encircles them in the arms of safety, while he that exercises no faith unto repentance is exposed to the whole law of the demands of justice; therefore only unto him that has faith unto repentance is brought about the great and eternal plan of redemption.
(Alma 34:15–16, italics added.)

In case you're interested, at the risk of presenting a "private interpretation," I present an article I wrote, the Roles of Justice, Sacrifice and Mercy in the Atonement of Christ and put it on my personal wiki. 

On 5/23/2025 at 7:49 AM, The Nehor said:

True, but God also knows us humans and should be able to work around that to a degree. I have a hard time dealing with the idea that an essentially omniscient being can’t get His point across because His servants muck it up so much.

There we go with those "mistakes of men." If His servants muck it up, how can God hold us responsible for those mistakes when God's servants have "mucked it up"? Of course he is able to work around that to a degree. 

In King Benjamin's sermon, he explained that to ensure a righteous judgment, the Savior’s blood atoned “for the sins of those who have fallen by the transgression of Adam” and for those “who have died not knowing the will of God concerning them, or who have ignorantly sinned.” A righteous judgment also required, he taught, that “the blood of Christ atoneth for” the sins of little children.

In the April 2020 General Conference said: "These scriptures teach a glorious doctrine: the Savior’s atoning sacrifice heals, as a free gift, those who sin in ignorance—those to whom, as Jacob put it, 'there is no law given.' Accountability for sin depends on the light we have been given and hinges on our ability to exercise our agency. We know this healing and comforting truth only because of the Book of Mormon and other Restoration scripture."

On 5/23/2025 at 7:49 AM, The Nehor said:

I wouldn’t do it the way God does. I am not arguing for it because i like the idea. It is just what has been taught to me by those I am supposed to believe have authority. Maybe they are wrong.

Unless it doesn’t work out and someone ends up in hell. In my experience being in torment doesn’t get that much easier just through knowing that it will end eventually.

What is hell? Our non-LDS Christian friends believe it lasts forever. But when Jesus describes it (see D&C 19:17-18) he says hell is what he suffered...

But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I; Which suffering caused myself, even God, the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore, and to suffer both body and spirit—and would that I might not drink the bitter cup, and shrink

The duration of that punishment (which has to be suffered in both the body and the spirit -- i.e. after resurrection) in earthly terms seems to be about 18 hours long. That's how long Jesus was suffering, beginning in the Garden of Gethsemane and ending upon the cross, when he said "It is finished." 

But the only people that have to experience the atonement in their own persons are those who reject Christ ultimately. This is not because Father wants them to suffer, but because justice must be meted out to them -- or else God would cease to be God. Those who reject him here, but accept him in the Spirit World, are home free, and do not suffer, having accepted Christ. I cannot remember where and when it was said, but I believe it was Elder Boyd K. Packer who said that the number who do reject Him in the end will be relatively few. And even they, once they atone for their sins, will have earned the Telestial Kingdom, which we understand to be a kingdom of glory as well as far better than anything we can imagine here.

But you know this, so I'm preaching to the choir, I think.